Diamond Books Puts Borders On Hold
According to an e-mail received by CR that looks as if it was first sent out today, written to look as if it came from Diamond Vice President Of Purchasing Bill Schanes (although it may have been sent from a different person's account) and cc'ed to a half-dozen Diamond Executives, Diamond Book Distributors confirmed they put their Borders account on hold last week when the reeling retail book giant suspended payment to a number of suppliers including Diamond. The body of that e-mail read:

This email is to confirm reports in the news that Borders is suspending payments to its suppliers, including Diamond. As a result, we have made the difficult decision to stop shipping them and put their account on hold, as of last week, until such time as they are able to resume payment.

DBD is actively seeking a resolution to this issue and will work with Borders to get shipments moving again provided that we can craft a solution that proves to be in the best interests of both DBD and our publishers.

If you have any additional questions or concerns, please feel free to drop me an email or give me a call.

DBD represents a number of good-sized comics publishing houses to the book trade, including Image, IDW, Dark Horse and Oni. It's unknown how much business Borders represents in the overall graphic novel landscape or to each publisher, and certainly the slow decline of the bookseller's fortunes has likely changed some of those numbers in dramatic fashion from their peak to the present day. A list of DBD's publishers is here.